Year in Review: Accidents, money drive top 10 online stories

LAS CRUCES — The public's thirst for information, especially that related to public salaries and money in general, drove the Las Cruces Sun-News readers' interest during 2012.

The two stories readers clicked online the most during the past year were first printed in late 2011 - both featuring a database of public employee salaries. More than any other story, visitors to the Sun-News Website clicked on ourpublic payroll series, exploring New Mexico State University's shift to spending less on salaries and trimming jobs.

That story was accompanied by a database, the second most visited story of 2012, outlining employees' salaries from every branch of local government. Throughout the year, readers continued to return to that database to explore what we, as taxpayers, pay our public officials.

Money owed, instead of money spent, was behind our third most viewed story of 2012. In early December, we reported that some 3,500 Doña Ana County residents were owed unclaimed money by the state. Readers wasted no time in checking to see if they were among those who had an unexpected windfall on the way.

News of a beloved Las Cruces businessman's death was the fourth most read story of the year. In May, La Var Washington's body was discovered on a parking lot off Dripping Springs Road on the New Mexico State University campus.

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He apparently died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound while inside a vehicle, according to NMSU police.

February began a string of tragic accidents that claimed lives on Doña Ana County roads when two Las Cruces men died in the second major crash on U.S. Highway 70 during the same week. Thomas Wilson, 20, who was behind the wheel of a 1999 white Toyota pickup, was reported to be driving erratically westbound toward Las Cruces early in the morning when he crossed the median and slammed into a Chevy truck driven by Neal Broderick, 52, who was headed eastbound, according to authorities.

In June, news of the raging Little Bear Fire near Ruidoso sparked our attention. As tens of thousands of acres and scores of homes and buildings were destroyed in the community many Las Crucens consider a favorite weekend getaway, readers checked the month-long progress of containment and cleanup, which will continue for years to come, and made this our sixth most read story of the year.

A family's 2-year-old pit-bull mauled a 16-month-old child in May and her grandmother was shot by a neighbor who was trying to kill the attacking dog. The child later died after being taken to the hospital and the grandmother later recovered from her physical injuries. This fatal attack revived the ongoing debate about unrestrained dogs, especially those of large or aggressive breed and led readers to make this our seventh most read story of 2012.

A fatal shooting in April spurred our eighth most read story. One man was killed and another wounded after being shot on South Valley Drive near University Avenue. Police arrested the alleged gunman, Jeremy Martinez, 21, of 6015 Sunny Lane, south of Las Cruces.Las Cruces police found Michael Hahn, 19, of Las Cruces in the middle of the roadway, lying dead from a gunshot wound when they were dispatched to a report just after midnight of a man with a gun.

What was to have been a festive Halloween morning turned tragic in October when an Onate High School student and his mother died in a horrific crash that left another woman injured. Again, the accident added to on a high-traffic stretch of U.S. 70.Officials said Keian Padilla, 15, and his mother, Marcia K. Parra, 35, were killed when a small SUV crossed the unfenced median, ramped into the air, and hit their black, four-door sedan. The accident spurred student groups to petition for better barriers on the median and led to our ninth most read story of the year.

Rounding out our top ten we return to the February accident,, again on U.S. 70. The breaking news and following traffic snarled traffic and began what would be a year of accidents, some fatal, many serious, on that stretch of road.

Online Editor Jason Gibbs may be reached at 541-5451. Follow him on Twitter @fjgwriter